Let me put it this way: They print expiration dates on SALT.
Now, it’s pretty convenient that stores here in Denmark sell products cheaper just before they “expire” because certain products actually get better with time like cheese.
who are you?
Submitted 2 days ago by Deceptichum@quokk.au to memes@sopuli.xyz
https://quokk.au/pictrs/image/902ca7b5-9e20-4af9-80dc-a0b72dee2a87.jpeg
Comments
RedSnt@feddit.dk 2 days ago
piccolo@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
because certain products actually get better with time like cheese.
Under the right conditions. Sitting on grocery shelves is not one of those right conditions.
RedSnt@feddit.dk 2 days ago
In rare cases white mold cheese will taste like blue mold cheese because of cross contamination, but that’s about the only defect I’ve experienced buying cheese close to their expiration dates. Oh, and camembert cheeses being a bit too runny and ammonia tasting, but as a sicko I kind of like that.
Prime_Minister_Keyes@lemm.ee 1 day ago
It’s about liability. Companies don’t want their salt returned to them after x years, especially not with some lame excuse. So they just define an expiration date y that’s far off enough to not drive customers away, but still minimizes the risk of complaints.
If a (big) customer successfully complains within this time span, they’ll simply decrease it.LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world 1 day ago
As someone who has gone through old stuff like that, imo it’s the packaging (a lot of which these days is coated in plastics that degrade over time) that the expiration date is for rather than the actual product. Eg the cardboard will break down or the cans will rust into the product.
Texas_Hangover@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
Expiration dates have a lot of leeway.
null_dot@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 day ago
Yeah this is me.
If it’s on or after the last day I need to leave it in the fridge for several weeks until I’m in the mood to acknowledge that it’s dead.
My partner does believe in use-by dates but she has very poor situational awareness and is just oblivious to the concept. Recently she tried drinking a flavoured milk that had been in the fridge for a few months.
meliaesc@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Was it flavored when she put it in the fridge?
ArsonButCute@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 days ago
Expiration dates are literally made up, very infrequently will any actual testing be done to see the exact time it takes for a food to decay enough to be either unenjoyable, unpalatable or inedible.
They’re usually 1 week from mfgr for unpreserved foods, 2 weeks to a month for soft foods like American sandwich bread, 3 months to a year for dry goods (depending on what it is) and up to several years for canned goods.
My salt has an expiration date. Salt is a rock, it is millions of years old (not sea salt, mined salt). It does not expire.
Pinklink@lemm.ee 2 days ago
I don’t know where you got your information, and I can’t speak for other food stuffs, but I used to work in a milk bottling facility. I did quality assurance. Part of my job was to take gallons of milk (many of them) and put them in refrigeration until two days after the expiration date, and then taste them. While most of them tasted pretty much fine, about 30% were sour, coagulated, or some other sign of type of spoiled.
Expiration dates are real, but they are an estimation of when the product will go bad. Use your own judgement. Smells/tastes bad/weird, or is oddly oily and stuff, probably don’t consume that. Seems completely fine but past the expiration date, you will probably be completely fine.
vrek@programming.dev 2 days ago
I don’t mean any offense but is hiring someone to drink expired milk the best way of testing it? Can’t they like measure bacteria or chemical composition or something?
Cethin@lemmy.zip 2 days ago
Yeah, most experiation dates are made up. Some are real, like milk usually. I’ll still drink milk after the date, but I always make sure to smell it if I’m approaching or past that date.
99% of foods you can smell or see if they’ve gone bad before you taste it. Always use your senses, not some date printed on it by a manufacturer that wants to sell more product. We’re literally evolved to identify food that’s gone bad.
pelespirit@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
Maybe you can answer this. How can whipping cream have such a long shelf life? It’s like a month. Milk is usually a week or two.
dejected_warp_core@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Except diary. Milk has an expiration date that (for me at least) is accurate to within 12 hours or so, when refrigerated.
Protip: if this plagues you, grab the Lactaid (lactose-free) stuff. It lasts longer. Soy milk lasts even longer than that, but I get that’s not for everyone.
RevolverSly@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Expiration dates are a myth
mic_check_one_two@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 day ago
They’re not a myth; they’re a scam. They’re set by the brands, by determining when the food is the “freshest”. But that determination is made entirely by the brand, and they have a direct financial incentive to encourage food waste. Because if consumers throw more food away, they buy more food. So they set the expiration dates extremely short, so people will throw food away before it actually goes bad.
ClamDrinker@lemmy.world 1 day ago
It also very much depends on your country, food authority, and retailer. Some food authorities have stricter categories for very perishable foods where unless it has gone very bad, you can’t see it’s not suitable for consumption anymore, eg. meat and vegetable. And while the producer has an incentive to encourage waste, the retailer has the incentive to reduce it, as you typically can’t sell items to consumers that are no longer within date (Again, depending on your location). If an item is unreasonably often thrown out by the retailer, that leads to consequences in the deals being made between the retailer and the producer.
howrar@lemmy.ca 1 day ago
They’re also highly incentivized to make you eat it when it’s freshest so you have a good experience with their food and become a repeat customer.
driving_crooner@lemmy.eco.br 1 day ago
If they go to the expiration date while still on the shelf ig going to go back to them, the supermarket isn’t going to pay for that.
Comment105@lemm.ee 1 day ago
Most things taste off or stale anywhere near the expression date.
If you can afford it and it’s a wildly overproduced thing like milk, I certainly wouldn’t encourage you to force it down.
If it’s scarce, don’t do it again. Maybe force it down. Probably use it in something where the lessened/worsened taste becomes a non-issue.
deathbird@mander.xyz 8 hours ago
What if neither of you believe in expiration dates but one of you think it turned and the other doesn’t?
Underwaterbob@lemm.ee 1 day ago
My wife just threw out a ~12 hour old fried rice we doggy bagged last night that I was planning on lunching on because we “touched it with our spoons”. Sigh.
Psythik@lemm.ee 1 day ago
She does know that reheating leftovers is a thing, and that heat kills bacteria, right?
valtia@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Underwaterbob@lemm.ee 1 day ago
It was in the fridge for 11 of those 12 hours!
AFKBRBChocolate@lemmy.world 2 days ago
There are different types of dates in the US. Few things have expiration dates, which means it can be dangerous (or, for medication, ineffective) after that date. Most things have “best before” dates, which means the company has tested the product that far from its production and found it still met the quality standard.
The problem is that the FDA requires that testing and that every product have such a date. People have mentioned salt, which is inert, having a date, and that’s probably the most ridiculous example, but there are lots of things that have super long shelf lives beyond the best buy dates. Honey, soy sauce, bottled water, and vinegar being examples that come to mind.
db2@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Old plastic bottled water can have chemicals from the plastic leached in to it that you wouldn’t want to ingest though.
DarrinBrunner@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Many years ago (I was there) expiration dates were useful and only on products that would actually expire–mostly just milk, cheese, and meat.
Then, I think it was Budweiser came up with the “born on date” marketing campaign for beer. Since then, on anything that doesn’t actually expire, like beer, it’s been used to prompt people to throw away perfectly good food, so they’ll hopefully buy more “fresh” food.
It’s been going on for so many years, we now have at least two generations who have been duped into believing them.
Klear@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Joke’s on you - I’m not in a relationship.
JayDee@lemmy.sdf.org 2 days ago
Oh they’re real. They’re just arbitrary most of the time.
HalfSalesman@lemm.ee 2 days ago
Expiration dates are useful, but they are not usually a hard end point to a food’s safety or edibility.
sploosh@lemmy.world 2 days ago
One’s own nose is usually the best way to see if old food is edible. Doesn’t smell good enough to eat? Don’t eat it.
synae@lemmy.sdf.org 2 days ago
My sense of smell is pretty bad. I only keep milk in my fridge for coffee so it lasts a while, and once it’s past the date I smell it every day assuming it could have gone bad. Usually it hasn’t, but occasionally it has curdled into chunks, and apparently I can’t tell the difference with my nose - only once the pour feels “off” or the chunks make their way into my coffee can I have any better indicator.
themeatbridge@lemmy.world 2 days ago
I recognize that “best by” dates are mostly bullshit, but I’m also a firm believer in “why risk it?” Especially for food where you can’t tell if it’s gone bad, like canned goods. I don’t fuck around with botulism.
NJSpradlin@lemmy.world 2 days ago
I’m pretty strict about it, a week is a fucking week and we need to maximize leftover prioritization to clear everything out within that timeframe. Especially if we’re using pricy ingredients.
My ex? Had a custom cake made for her birthday, from a pastry chef friend of hers, one who’d been on TV and worked in a nice restaurant in a major city. Not Michelin Star rated, but newly successful on some level. Anyway, she would take the entire remaining slice out and nibble on it… nightly. Then put it back after sitting and watching tv for half an hour or so. By the end of that week she’d finished it, and then promptly learned the importance of letting food sit at room temperature for too long, especially something not baked full of preservatives and using both dairy and egg products.
We didn’t make it to a second incident, but she confirmed that she’d cut a portion off and eat that instead of bringing the entire thing out nightly.
Rentlar@lemmy.ca 2 days ago
In Japan they have two types of dates, which map to “Use by” and “Best before”, but they don’t use them interchangeably or some vague middle-of-the-road term like “expiry date”. One is operative, the other is a recommendation.
消費期限 (shouhi-kigen) literally means “consumption time limit” and 賞味期限 (shoumi-kigen) literally means “guarantee of taste time limit”.
weker01@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
Germany does that too.
Especially minced meat always is “use by” and you really should respect that. Someone I know went to the hospital for that.
yozul@beehaw.org 2 days ago
A lot of food doesn’t even have an expiration date. It’s more common on a lot of foods to have a sell by date, which is not the same thing as an expiration date, and some foods are even just labelled with a packaged date, which is hopefully always in the past. Otherwise you’ve got bigger problems than spoiled food. MREs are especially notorious for this.
That being said though, I’m still usually the one throwing food out. At some point you just have to admit you’re not going to eat it, and no one wants your dubious opened packages or half eaten leftovers. It’s just gonna have to go eventually.
billwashere@lemmy.world 2 days ago
My wife is servsafe certified and I have a terrible sense of smell. Guess which one I am?
agamemnonymous@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
Best By dates are not expiration dates, expiration dates are estimates.
That said, my wife has no concept of expiration until something is obviously covered in mold, and says some wild stuff. “Oh that’s got lemon juice in it, it doesn’t expire” like babe, lemon juice isn’t some timeless magic spell.
AmazingAwesomator@lemmy.world 2 days ago
i’m the person that understands the conflict of interest between companies and the creation of their own expiration dates.
entwine413@lemm.ee 2 days ago
In the US, expiration dates aren’t a thing. The date on the product is just the last date the company will guarantee it meets their quality standards.
AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world 2 days ago
With one exception. Baby food/formula. Those companies do not fuck around with the dates, because they got regulated.
Damage@feddit.it 2 days ago
Are you sure you do? Expiration dates are a factor when buying food, longer shelf life usually boosts sales.
Source: worked for a time making machines specifically for enhancing the shelf life of a specific product.
peaceful_world_view@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I believe in expiration dates, my dogs do not.
SnokenKeekaGuard@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 days ago
Expiration date believers are my sworn enemies
SpaceNoodle@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Why do you regret that?
SnokenKeekaGuard@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 days ago
Food waste. Completely unnecessary
ReputedlyDeplorable@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
They are estimations. I do give them weight in the to eat or not to eat decision, but I also use my own senses.
alzymologist@sopuli.xyz 2 days ago
There is no “expired”, only “improperly fermented”. Sure, it could be very bad, but then you should’ve paid attention to it in advance, respect the nutrient and all living things who brought it about.
lukecooperatus@lemmy.ml 2 days ago
Could you explain your suggestion that there’s a correlation between one’s subjective awareness of a food item’s nutritional content and it’s objective fitness for human consumption over time? These things seem entirely unrelated to me.
wander1236@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
What if I’m both? I know expiration dates aren’t literally when the thing instantly stops being edible, but if the date is from months ago, I know it’s probably not worth it, except for maybe canned/frozen food.
Commiunism@beehaw.org 2 days ago
I was germophobic my entire life up until like a year or two ago where I kinda got over it and stopped giving a shit, but I’m still incredibly paranoid about food expiration, even when the best before day hasn’t been reached as is 1-2 days away.
lukecooperatus@lemmy.ml 2 days ago
These do not sound like mutually exclusive perspectives. Why not both?
can@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
I recognize that “best before” means exactly what it says
grrgyle@slrpnk.net 2 days ago
Me.
If it’s after the BB date it means you have to use your sense and senses to make the determination.
InFerNo@lemmy.ml 1 day ago
It’s not going to magically be super bad when it’s the BB date +1.